Second cut hay is made on home farm

Adirondack case guy

Well-known Member
The uncles sold their standing second cut to a local dairy farmer. His second cut never came in due to lack of rain and being on high ground with limestone bed rock base. Second cut here just a bit better, because it was harvested earlier, but we are also on limestone bed rock. I believe by the sparsity of the bales that yield was about a ton per Acer of big bales to be wrapped for balage. They mowed and baled about 175A the last 2 days.
This neighbor farmer wanting the second cut was a savior for the uncles. The BTO beef farmer who has bought all their hay and straw for the past 5 years is in financial strafes and could not buy their first cut hay. They had a custom operator come in and make dry, big square bales, which filled the heifer barn and then they wrapped a bunch of the bales for storage and stacked them in the paved barnyard.
Not sure what is going to happen up on the farm. One uncle has to get blood transfusions 3 days a week, at the hospital, and the other older one can hardly crawl up into a tractor anymore.
Loren
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I rolled up 73 rounds today. The second cutting on that field was probably the best I'll have this year given how hot and dry it turned off after a terrible wet spring. I had to rough it,the AC compressor seized up on the tractor yesterday. I took a bearing out on the baler and that cost me some time,but I got it finished up. I just hope we get some rain to bring on a third.
 
Second cutting is out of the question in the normally moist Pacific Northwest- We've had less than an inch of rain since May 1, and the grass went dormant as soon as it was cut. Everybody thinks of this area (western Washington) as raining "all the time", but we're actually the second driest area in the US in July, August and September, only Arizona and that area is drier. But we started early with the dry weather this year, so wonder what it will be like here in September. I had 4 very healthy 50+ year old Douglas Fir trees, diameters up to 2 feet, 3 of them died 2 summers ago from the heat and drought.
 
Just keep rubbing it in why don't you!! LOL! I am still trying to get a first cutting off of a field that I left the cows on a little too long in the spring. Then finally start the second cutting on my other field. Wish the weather guessers would be a little more reliable. They predict 50% or more and we get nothing. 20% and we get rain.
 
That really is a beautiful place Loren - hopefully some of the next generation will want to keep it going. My dairy buddy has been chopping his second cutting for the last week or so, and he's getting about 1/4 of what he got for first cutting - it really is getting dry. I see some corn starting to curl too, but starting Sunday, there's rain in the forecast for the next fifteen days, so that should perk things up
Pete
 
It's funny to see hay fields that big and flat. Lots of fields in Central AL ain't that flat, cotton seems to get the big fields and hay gets what's left in alot of places. PS y'all need a bigger baler tractor!! Ha ha.
 

We have gotten some rain and more forecast, but it is still nip and tuck as to whether or not a second cut will be economically feasible.
 
Casecollector : We have about 4or5 of those old steel wheel rakes some deere and a couple of IH. Went to wheel rakes about 15 years ago. Still use one of the old ones at times.
I would like to know just what they do besides take the wheels off those whirly gig rakes when they go in a chuck hole in the field. Those little wheels would be fine on concrete.
 
(quoted from post at 03:26:47 07/20/18) Curious as to how you eventually made out with that gib key on your Heston haybine?
I updated the post on it but it took some persuasion with a large tube and sledge hammer.
 

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